In the Eye of the Storm
by Screwball200
Summary: The date is 2467, and in a newly discovered system at the edge of the Empire, a Terran survey flotilla encounters a threat beyond anything the Empire has faced before.
1. Prolouge

Disclaimer: I do not own Battlestar Galactica. Nor do I own Starfire, or the Starfire books by David Weber, upon which some of the Terran technology is based.

In the Eye of the Storm Prologue

In 2153, humanity first made it to another star. The revolutionary new technology that allowed this, the foldspace drive, was pioneered by Dr Kyoko Matshushimi, and came to be known as the Matshushimi drive. Soon after, the inertia less drive, product of decades of development by the largest global corporations, opened space to anyone and everyone, for although it was an expensive device to buy, it required no reaction mass, and thus quickly repaid the initial investment. Humanity, ever curious, had expanded out from Sol like a tsunami. Colonies had sprung up thick and fast, and wealth was everywhere.

It was in these first days of interstellar expansion that humanity had encountered its first alien races: the Naduk, peaceful and friendly, the Chen, aloof and isolationist, and the Ascellians, violent and hateful. The dream had shattered when the first attempt was made to contact the Ascellians. Ships sent near them were instantly fired upon and destroyed, and it was only luck, along with the timely intervention of the Naduk that saved Humanity from enslavement. The First Interstellar War had seen the creation of the Terran Royal Navy, and when the second war with the Ascellians came, that navy had beaten them back from the worlds that had been lost in the first conflict.

It was during this war that the first ruins were discovered. They were ancient. When Alexander the Great had been besieging Tyr, these aliens had been in their final decline, and many new technologies had been procured from their ancient cities, along with mountains of electronic data. To the shock of the technicians assigned to discover what those records held, a project was discovered that dwarfed anything man had ever undertaken. Contained in those ancient data crystals had been the records of the greatest social experiment in history. Hundreds of thousands of humans had been abducted from Earth and transplanted onto other planets, so that their development could be observed without outside influences. Expeditions dispatched to the planets on record found evidence of long dead human habitation more often than not, but occasionally a living human world was found. Such worlds were quickly integrated into the Empire, so as to protect them from outside threats like the Ascellians.But there were several that remained unexplored, sometimes because the records of their location were lost or corrupted, sometimes because the distances involved were too great. These worlds were left to their own devices.

It is now 2467, and The Terran Empire has just emerged victorious from another war with the Ascellians, albeit with heavy casualties. With the end of the war, a large surplus of survey ships has become available, and parliament has decided to authorize exploration and colonization missions to the edges of Imperial space. Survey Flotilla 27, TRN, has completed its prejump checks, and is preparing to enter a previously unexplored system. It is there that they will discover something truly unexpected, and something truly dangerous.

AN: Only a short intro. Please any feedback is welcome, provided that it is constructive, and not just a flame.


	2. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I do not own Battlestar Galactica, nor do I own any part of the Starfire universe, on which some of the Terran technology is based.

AN: All dates in this story are in Terran Standard Reckoning (TSR). This takes place approximately 10 years after the Cylon attacks on the twelve colonies, President Rosalin has died of her cancer, and the President in this story is an OC. I would also like to point out that updates (for anyone who cares) will not usually be this quick, but at the moment I have nothing else that I have to do.

In the eye of the storm.

Chapter one

**M324-02**

**1650hrs**

**24 June 2467 TSR**

_The fleet had tracked the colonials to this system, and had finally been in a position to bring significant force to bear, for the whole of the follow up force dispatched from the Core had been within jump range, unlike previous contacts, when only light recon forces had been available._

_Thirty basestars crept through the outer reaches of this previously unknown brown dwarf system, heading towards the electro-neutrino spoor that betrayed the location of their foe. And the colonials knew nothing of their presence. The last remnants of the colonies would soon be destroyed, and this battle would provide a useful arena to test the latest systems. The new missiles and beam weapons would make the fight significantly easier if they worked as projected._

**Silesia System**

**1655hrs**

**24 June 2467 TSR**

Rear Admiral Louise Archer sat on the bridge of the _Dane _class survey cruiser _Columbus_ studying the small group of green dots displayed in her repeaters. There were twelve in all- four of them _Dane_ survey cruisers, lightly armed, but carrying the most sophisticated instrumentation yet devised by the RTN. Two were _Shikoku_ class light carriers, and four _Excalibur _A class heavy cruisers. The remaining two were Borzoi_ class _command ships.

Louise scowled at those extra icons. It irked her that the officer in charge of those warships was her second in command. True, commodore Arthur Harrison was a competent tactician. More than competent, if she were to be truthful. However, this was a survey mission, not a strike against an Ascellian PDC, and it required specialists, not gung-ho warriors, who solved every problem with a salvo of thermonuclear missiles. She would much rather one of the captains of the other survey cruisers take up the role of 2IC, but Harrison's seniority had made that impossible.

'And if they did run into trouble' a corner of her mind thought, 'then we'll have a Battlefleet officer to get us out of it'. That thought was quickly silenced. There was a greater chance of getting killed in a groundcar accident dirtside than there was of encountering hostile aliens on a first transit.

"So, is the orchestra ready to perform?" she asked the young lieutenant seated at the comm officer's station.

"If the conductor is, sir." He replied with a grin. "All ships report ready for transit, Admiral."

"Excellent. Captain Masters, you will move us to our jump coordinates. Lieutenant Alba, inform the rest of the flotilla that we are initiating jump procedures, and tell them to stand by for drone update."

Lieutenant Alba, the young comm officer acknowledged her command and began punching instructions into his console, as Robert Masters, her Flag captain (not that she really had flag staff on a survey flotilla this small), ordered the necessary maneuvers.

"Helm, move us into position, bearing three-three-two by one-five-eight, one quarter drive."

"Three-three-two by one-five-eight, quarter drive aye." Repeated the dark haired yeoman, Gonzales, Archer believed his name was. On her plot, _Columbus_ drew ahead of the rest of the flotilla, creeping towards the amber line on her display that represented Silesia's Matsushimi horizon. A counter had appeared in the top right corner of the display, counting down the seconds until _Columbus_ reached the invisible line in space past which the Matsushimi drive could propel her across the gulf between stars. Evidently, Captain Masters had been observing his own repeater, for as the counter hit 90, he began issuing a series of rapid orders.

"Chief Johanson, prepare the ship for Matsushimi jump."

"Aye sir." Replied the blonde haired woman seated directly in front of the command station. The varied bridge crew slammed their shock frames closed as the Chief of the Boat thumbed her console, beginning a shipwide broadcast. "Now hear this, now here this. Mitsushimi jump in ninety seconds. Secure the ship at jump stations, repeat, secure the ship at jump stations. That is all."

As she was giving her command, Masters continued.

"Lieutenant Alba, activate the Requiem drone, and set it for continuous download and auto launch. Yeoman Gonzales, charge Matsushimi Drive on my mark." The counter continued to tick down towards zero. When it reached twenty, Masters gave the command "Mark"

The background, almost subliminal hum created by the inertia-less drive rose to a high pitched squeal as power bled into the giant capacitors in the heart of the _Columbus_ creating a slight, almost unnoticeable vibration in the decks and bulkheads of the ship. Charging the capacitors needed for the Mitsushimi Drive to function before the Matsushimi limit of a star increased the wear on them enormously, but SOP insisted that they be fully charged before said limit was reached. The closer to any star's Matsushimi limit a jump was initiated, the smoother that jump would be. The reason for this was not very well understood, but it was agreed that it was due somehow to the gravitational force exerted by the star. Merchant ships usually waited until they were past the limit to charge their capacitors, as the reduced wear and tear meant lower maintenance costs for the operators. Navy crews, on the other hand, had to put up with that god awful howl for twenty seconds before any jump.

"All stations report secure for jump, sir." Declared Chief Johansen, as the time ticked down to five, setting off a beeping alarm on her console. In response, she patched into the shipwide address system, announcing "All hands, prepare for jump in four, three, two one..."

There was a moment in which it felt like the whole of the ship twitched, where gravity realigned itself, causing bulkheads to become floors and floors to become bulkheads leaving the inner ear unable to cope with the changes, where, for the briefest of instants, the _Columbus_ ceased to exist, before it plunged back into reality in a place sixteen light years away. Archer resisted the temptation to shake her head to clear it of the lingering disorientation of transit as the nausea created by her protesting inner ear quickly receded. She could see one or two of the less experienced crew on the bridge doing so, but most of the older spacers were as blasé about it a she. Stupid as the reaction was- anyone who said the he didn't suffer from jump stress was someone she wouldn't ever loan money to- the more experienced crew saw it as necessary that they not display the discomfort that Matsushimi jumps put them through.

"Primary's a Type five sir."

"No artificial emissions detected."

"All departments report successful jump."

"Three planets detected..."

The reports were standard after a successful first transit to a system, and mostly of no importance to Archer. Only indications of intelligent life in the system would affect SOP, and as there were no such indications, there was only one path to proceed along.

"Lieutenant Alba, update the alpha drone and send it back to Silesia. Call the rest of the flotilla forward under condition baker. Helm, put us in a standard spiral, tactical, you will set condition baker."

Archer largely ignored the acknowledgments, and went back to contemplating her display. A type five was a brown dwarf, which meant that habitable planets were unlikely, but that didn't mean that the system was unimportant. The Kronos system, for instance, was a major supplier of the deuterium used in fleet fusion reactors, containing as it did a gas giant that was so massive it was almost a star in it's own right, but not a single habitable planet. The lack of artificial emissions also meant that she could call forward the rest of the flotilla. Only the survey cruisers had the ability to cloak, which meant that the battlefleet escorts would be visible to any watching sensors, but condition baker mandated strict EMCON, as well as cloak for those ships that could do so. That made them marginally less obvious, and besides, the chances of some hostile force waiting out there in cloak, being in a position to detect the escorts, and also being strong enough to take them on, was less than remote in a system that was obviously uncolonized and seemed to be of little importance.

A drone spat from the _Columbus_, streaking back towards the Matsushimi limit that she was already several thousand kilometers away from, and vanished in a flicker of visible and non visible radiation.

**Silesia System**

**1710hrs**

**24 June 2467 TSR**

"Drone transit detected, sir."

Commodore Arthur Harrison looked over at the sensor yeoman who made the report.

"Is it from Admiral Archer?"

"Yes sir. Downloading content... sir, it's an order to move the flotilla forward under condition baker. Authenticated victor-charlie-charlie-alpha-one."

"Very well. Howard." He said, turning to his comm operator. "Flotilla orders: set condition baker, come to heading three-three-two by one-five-eight, one quarter drive. Prepare to make transit."

"Aye sir. Message sent: condition baker, heading three-three-two by one-five-eight, one quarter drive. Prepare for transit." Harrison listened carefully to the lieutenant's repeat of his message, checking that there were no mistakes, which was the whole point of a ritual that was seen by many civilians to be useless military formality. Satisfied that the correct orders had been sent, he lent back in his command chair and watched the icons on his plot speed towards their jump coordinates.

**M324-02**

**1725hrs**

**24 June 2467 TSR**

_Cybernetic intelligences 'blinked' in surprise as a cluster of emissions signatures appeared where they had no right to be. They were unfamiliar, not listed in any database, and showed no inclination to move. From the lack of transmissions detected, the unknown intruders were practicing strict EMCON, but it was not enough to prevent them from detection. They would be in range of the site where the final conflict with the colonials would take place, and could decide to get involved. That could pose a problem. Their abilities were unknown, but by the strength of their sensor footprints, they had immense power output. That suggested highly advanced technology. They would have to be persuaded not to involve themselves, but if the worst came to the worst, there were only eight of them. The thirty basestars should be able to handle that easily, and if not, another ninety six were only three hours behind this fleet. The colonial remnant would not escape this time, whether the aliens intervened or not. _


	3. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: I do not own Battlestar Galactica, nor do I own any part of the Starfire universe, on which some of the Terran technology is based.

AN: Thanks for the reviews. Um, to clear up the point about the Matsushimi Drive and the inertia-less drive, they are different things. The M-drive is for FTL jumps, and the inertia-less drive is for STL maneuvering.

If I don't give a Place/Time thing at a scene change, assume that its the same system and time. This only applies in space. On planets, I'll give a city name as well.

In the Eye of the Storm

Chapter 2

**M324-02**

**1725hrs**

**24 June 2467 TSR**

"All ships report successful transit sir." Harrison nodded in acknowledgment as the chorus of reports filled the bridge. Ignoring his fading nausea, he glanced at his plot. The survey ships had already begun to move off deeper into the system, whilst the escort waited, inert,but ready to spring into action if needed. That first burst of comm signals was all that would be transmitted unless a combat situation arose. Under condition baker, even the tightly focused transmissions used for battlelink communication were not permitted.

It was not a situation that Harrison enjoyed. He'd never understood why survey command insisted on such tight EMCON. Limiting comm transmissions and banning active sensor sweeps in unexplored systems was fair enough. If some unknown hostile force was too far away to detect both your M-jump and the impeller field created by the inertia-less drive, he might still be close enough to detect the distinctive emissions created by those particular activities. What he would not detect were the transmissions required by active battlelink systems. Designed to tie both the offensive and defensive armament of a ship together with the other ships in its battlegroup, battlelink was an impressive enhancement to the capabilities of RTN ships, allowing precisely coordinated, time on target fire from up to six ships at once, and ensuring that point defense functioned at maximum efficiency, allowing targets to be allocated to each ship so that the maximum number of threats were engaged. Crucially for the RTN's defensive doctrine, it allowed ships to cover the blind spot directly to the rear of the vessel, where no weapons could be brought to bear, of the other ships in their battlegroup. This blind spot was the favourite striking area for fighters, as the leviathans they were targeting had no way to retaliate. Battlelink had probably been responsible for the deaths of more pilots than any other military technology in history. Designed to be secure and untappable in the midst of battle, it's emissions were all but undetectable at more than two light seconds, and any vessel that close could hardly fail to miss the massive energy signature of an active impeller field, now could they?

More importantly to Harrison, his current lack of battlelink meant that his effective combat power was reduced by at least thirty percent. If anybody was out there, and was of a mind to kill his ships, they would be alone against any incoming missile storm or fighter strike, and having active battlelink would have made no difference to their chances of detection if any prospective opponent knew they were there. That is to say, detection was one hundred percent certain if any little green men were in detection range. Worse, his ships were prohibited from even having their shields at standby, as even hot shield generators produced an energy signature even easier to spot than an impeller field. Active shields were even more distinctive, which meant that if anybody was inclined to take a potshot at him, he was probably dead. It did not, however, look like that was the case this time. Unless said little green men were hiding in cloak, then there was nobody there. Whilst the Acsellians he had made a career out of fighting might have been paranoid enough to place cloaked picket forces in useless system, the chances of meeting another race of interstellar sociopaths was astronomical. Until the initial survey was completed and he'd received instructions to end condition baker from Admiral Archer, however, he could do nothing but wait.

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**M324-02**

**1735hrs**

**24 June 2467 TSR**

On _Galactica_, chaos reigned supreme. Bare minutes before, an overwhelmingly powerful Cylon fleet had seemed to materialise out of nothingness, well inside _Galactica's_ theoretical sensor envelope. Fleeing before the Cylons for ten years had degraded both sensor range and acuity, but it had- until now at least- been possible to detect approaching basestars well before they entered firing range. _These_ Cylons had snuck up on them, and were only about five minutes away from inflicting thermonuclear murder on the fleeing refugee fleet. Already the _Galactica _was dropping back, placing itself between the rest of the fleet and the oncoming holocaust. The civilian ships were accelerating at the best speed they could manage individually, putting bruising stress on the occupants, and _Galactica's _crash deceleration was fairly unpleasant for the personnel aboard her also. It was a move that smacked of desperation. Cylon raiders could out run the fastest ship in the fleet- machines had little fear of acceleration stress- and the force arrayed against the battlestar would roll over her like a nuclear steamroller.

Then there was that mysterious group of high energy sensor contacts that had appeared at about the same time as the Cylon battlefleet. The range was too long to get detailed readings, but their power output was terrific. No one had ever seen anything like them, and there was unspoken dread amongst the crew in CIC that they were some new Cylon vessel that made defeat more inevitable than it already was. They had not yet made any action, not given any indication that they knew the colonial fleet even existed, and bar a brief initial burst of comm signals, had made no transmissions since their appearance. Those signals, what few could be intercepted, were heavily encrypted and scrambled, inviolate to any casual inspection, but they were short, mere seconds long, far too little time to exchange complex tactical data. The consensus was that they were merely reports of successful hyperspace transit. I any case, another eight vessels would hardly make a difference in the upcoming massacre, whether they joined in on the side of the Cylons or Colonials.

Commander Adama strode through the chaos of personnel dashing to their battle stations, an oasis of calm in the disorder surrounding him. He had donned a comm headset when the first call for condition one had echoed through the _Galactica_, and he was speaking into it now.

"How many basestars?" He winced "Damn. Get us broadside on to them. Have DC teams standing by and get any available Vipers into action _now_."

The battlestar shuddered as she piled on more deceleration, spinning _spinning_ to present her port weapons batteries to her foes. Lieutenant Gaeta's voice continued over Adama's headset.

"Those unknowns still aren't doing anything. They might not get involved at all. But, regardless, this is going to hurt. A lot. And there's something wrong about those basestars. Apart from the fact that they seem to have found a way to become invisible to sensors, their acceleration is too high. Either they've cut mass, or they've sprung two technological surprises on us at once. Not too surprising I suppose, they have an intact R&D establishment, whilst we..."

"Thats enough, lieutenant." Adama snapped. "We can still get away from this. We just need to buy the fleet enough time to charge their hyperdrives, and then we can leave. We might even survive." This last was said to the young man in person, as Adama stepped into CIC, striding over to the DRADIS screen in the centre of the installation. The red blips of the Cylon fleet were almost in range. Already, the smaller dots of raiders were spilling from them, far outnumbering the Vipers exiting the _Galactica_. Turning to Gaeta, he gave the familiar command.

"Stand by enemy suppression barrage."

"Standing by, aye." Targeting systems reached out from both sides, groping through the darkness with mindless malevolence, struggling to find an enemy for their attached weapons to kill. Then Cylons crossed into the range of the rows of mass drivers and railguns that lined the _Galcatica's _flanks.

"Fire!"

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"Sir, I'm getting some strange readings here." The young woman sitting at plotting certainly sounded confused.

'Probably she thought that being in such a state was better than being bored stiff, which was her previous state', Harrison thought. Survey duty- as one of the escort, anyway- was notoriously boring, and the midshipman was just out of the academy. She looked almost like a child dressed in her mother's uniform. He did not voice his thought, however. Instead, he simply said "Oh?"

"Yes sir. Here" Activating the tactical holodisplay in the centre of the bridge, she highlighted a small section of space not more than thirty light seconds away. "It looks like a bunch of really low power impeller fields. They're not cloaked, but they're so weak it's possible that they're just sensor ghosts."

This was alarming. Thirty light seconds was just under ninety thousand kilometers. That was well inside the missile envelope, even for standard missiles, and not that far shy of the maximum range of most energy weapons. If that was a ship, or a group of ships out there, then they were creeping around awfully suspiciously.

"Can you confirm that there is a drive source out there?"

"Negative sir. I can't get a solid reading on it, but I don't think that its a ghost. It hasn't gone away, and it's showed a constant acceleration between the points I've detected it at. I'm defining it as group sierra." As she turned in her seat to deliver her statement, her console let out a wail that Harrison, veteran of the recent Third Interstellar War, recognised all too well. She whirled back to her board.

"Multiple electromagnetic emission sources! High frequency lidar and radar! Battlecomp calls them targeting systems!" The holosphere blinked as the projected locations of the scanning objects were placed on the display.

"General quarters! End EMCON, engage battlelink!" Harrison yelled. "Flotilla orders: Raise shields, charge weapons grid, stand by point defense!"

"Flotilla orders: Raise shields, charge weapons, stand by point defense aye." Repeated Howard, as the GQ alarm began to howl, and the crew of _Atlantis_ thundered to their stations. On the plot, the icon's of the flotilla changed from a steady green to a blinking blue, whilst its possible aggressors remained a red haze in the holosphere.

"I want an active sensor sweep now. Find me some targets to run a plot on!" Bellowed the young tactical officer, as lights on her board began shifting from red inactive icons to amber standby or green ready lights. It was doubtful that most of the techs and ratings had arrived at those 'ready' weapons batteries or point defense stations, but if those there thought that they were ready, she had no way of checking, and it only took three people to operated the basic systems needed to fire the weapons. The extra personnel were for redundancy.

"Engaging active sensors!" There was a collective gasp on the flagship's bridge as the extent of the fleet before them was revealed.

"Jesus." Someone breathed. "What the hell have we walked into?" The group were broken out of their shock by the scream of the midshipman at the tactical console. "Missile launch! Birds... not inbound. Closing on target sierra three-one from targets sierra one through three-oh. Estimated time to impact... twenty five seconds... mark! Multiple fighter launches detected. Bogeys outbound from targets sierra one through sierra three-one on convergent courses."

"What the..?" Harrison glanced over at the exclamation, seeing Howard staring at the display in shock. He grinned at the expression on the commander's face.

"Hmm. It seems that we've stumbled on somebody else's war. And I don't particularly want to get involved, not with fleets of that size running around. Get me a fighter shell at one light second, and keep tracking everything they do. If they take a shot at us, I want to hit back, hard."

"Aye sir."

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_The first missiles sped towards the _Galactica _and raiders spat from launch bays, ready to add their payload of thermonuclear death to the carnage. These missiles were fitted with far more destructive warheads than the colonials had seen before, and, it was hoped, allow the fleet to finally stamp out these annoying remnants of their enemies._

_As the raiders assigned to the strike against the _Galactica _launched, another pair, unarmed, but equipped with extra sensor gear, sped off towards the group of unidentified vessels. The outbreak of hostilities had finally drawn some reaction. Comm chatter had blossomed between them, and multiple sensor emissions had been detected. Two of the ships had begun launching fighters, but the contacts were frustratingly featureless. Only that intense blaze of energy registered, allowing no detailed scans at this range. That was what the two raiders were for. To gain detailed observations, and establish contact. Or to establish if they had hostile intentions. It would be better to loose two raiders in discovering such, as opposed to this unknown element striking by surprise. _

_What was not expected was that the occupants of those ships to be human. The fighters, possessing far less intense energy levels, were the first objects scanned by the raiders, and the results left no doubt. The life forms aboard those vessels were human, and that left only one option- they had to be exterminated._

_Twenty of the basestars, along with their fighter components, broke off from the engagement with the _Galactica_, and moved towards the other group of human ships, spewing missiles towards them from well inside optimum engagement range. A salvo of 160 missiles was followed by 2400 fighters, each bearing twelve smaller missiles of its own. Though the fighter missiles were smaller, it was the drives that had been cut down, not the warheads. They were each as powerful, individually as the longer ranged shipboard missiles._

_The beings on those ships would have smiled if they were able. The long hunt was finally drawing to a close._

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Next: See the RTN get its head handed to it by the Cylons. See the colonials (barely) escape the jaws of death. And see the Royal and Imperial parliament go into a state of collective shock at the news of another war.


	4. Chapter 3

Disclaimer: I don't own Battlestar Galactica. Seriously.

**M324-02**

**1735hrs**

**24 June 2467 TSR**

Harrison saw the torrent of threat icons speeding towards his ships, and instantly came to the conclusion that he would not survive this engagement. Those missiles had inertialess drives, and without having to worry about damaging fragile organic bodies, they had a far greater acceleration than any ship could hope to match. His flotilla, starting from a dead stop, could never hope to avoid the salvo hurtling towards it. And the fighters from his two light carriers couldn't possibly stop the tidal wave of small craft pouring towards the Terran ships.

"Enemy birds in flight! Impact in four-five seconds... mark!"

"Fighters inbound! One thousand plus!"

"Point defence free! Bring the flotilla to three-one-two by eight-five-one, flank speed. Guns, you may return fire."

"Three-one-two by eight-five-one, aye."

The flotilla began to move, arcing back towards the M-Limit at an agonisingly slow speed. The ships had been stationary, and it took time to accelerate. There were limits to the inertialess drive. Push it too far, and the internal bulkheads of the offending ships would be covered in a thin past that used to be a crew.

Only the two command cruisers, _Atlantis _and _London_ mounted external missile racks, and they emptied them in the first return salvo. 40 missiles sped back towards the unknown assailants, perfectly coordinated by battlelink systems, and directed at only two targets.

---

_The strength of the first return salvo was surprising. Despite the difficulty in observing these mysterious human ships, the fleet had been able to determine that they were small. The largest was barely two hundred and fifty meters long. The fifty percent drop in density on the follow up launches, however, was encouraging. The precise method by which the greater number of initial missiles had been achieved was unknown, but analysis of the wreckage would doubtless reveal the answer._

_The fleet's own second salvo spat out of the launchers, but in that time, the enemy had launched two more of his own. If those ships had been larger, this would have been cause for concern, however, the ships putting out the most fire were launching only four missiles per broadside. Such a paltry weight of fire could never hope to saturate the point defence of a basestar._

_---_

Commodore Harrison watched the missiles move in his display. The enemy missiles had a slightly lower acceleration than his own, and the two salvoes would arrive roughly simultaneously. The enemy had only now launched a second wave of missiles, and the clear advantage in launch technology would have cheered him immensely if it would have made any difference in the eventual outcome. As it was, all the technology on these ships was being effectively handed over to this new enemy.

One look at the swarm of fighters following the missiles in made it clear that they were all dead. If those fighters mounted missiles, even just one each, it still came out to more than a thousand warheads. There were so many of the bastards that plotting still hadn't gotten a firm estimate of numbers, and the number of missiles each fighter mounted was unknown as well, but it seemed unreasonable to assume that the enemy didn't have nukes. A thousand nuclear warheads would be more than enough to finish off his command, assuming that they were at least megaton range.

His own fighters wouldn't be able to do anything about it. Sixty fighters were no match for the juggernaut racing towards them, and if he held the carriers with the rest of his units, they would only spread the protection of his point defence thinner, without fulfilling any useful role. But they had a higher acceleration than the rest of his ships. They, along with the survey vessels, could get away.

"Lieutenant Howard, tell the carriers to collect their fighters. Once al fighters are on board, I want them to head for the limit at maximum acceleration. Keep a continuous tac download active. Let their computers can carry far more information that a drone's memory. And send the bug out signal to the survey ships. Tell Admiral Archer I'm in command now."

"Aye sir."

"Sir!" Someone called. Harrison turned, and identified the speaker as the young Lieutenant, Peters, sitting at the main defence control station. "Enemy missiles have not deployed counter measures. They're coming in like they can't even see what we're doing!"

Lieutenant James Peters worked frantically at his console. There was no hope of him possibly stopping all of the missiles heading towards them, much less the far greater numbers of fighters following, but that didn't mean that he wouldn't try as hard as possible. He had projected paths for ninety percent of the incoming birds, but between keeping track of the missiles, the fighters, and the frustratingly indistinct contacts near the edge of the active sensor envelope, things were slipping through the cracks. The computers of a cruiser flotilla simply didn't have the capacity of line units, and SF 27 had been unlucky enough to stray into range of vessels that _were_ line units.

They were obviously from a different tactical background, he thought, as he desperately punched in fire patterns and assigned defensive priority values to units in his battlegroup. A Terran fleet that size would have been able to put out far heavier missile barrages, but far fewer fighters.

His terminal beeped at him. The enemy missiles were about to cross the fifteen light second mark, inside of which they would be in range of counter missiles, and inside of which they would start to deploy ECM and drones. The red threat icons on his flatscreen display edged towards the amber line tracing a circle around the icons of the Terran ships, and crossed it, just as he finished bringing his active defences on-line. Shields still weren't active- the generators hadn't had a chance to warm up yet, and they hadn't even been on standby before the engagement.

'It was unlikely they would be active in time to play any part in the upcoming battle,' he thought, then twitched in shock. The enemy missiles had done precisely nothing. Not a single drone, no blanket of static to wash away the incoming signals. Zip. Nada. No response to his counter missiles, either, no switch to evasive attack patterns, nothing. They just continued serenely along their pre-plotted courses, as if ignorant of the defensive fire racing to meet them.

"Sir!" He called to the Commodore. "Enemy missiles have not deployed counter measures. They're coming in like they can't even see what we're doing!"

---

_The fleet watched the fighters the unknown humans had deployed vanish. Two of the ships- obviously the carriers- began moving away at an extreme acceleration. No ship in the fleet, bar lightly equipped Raiders, could match that acceleration. It meant that two of their foes, at least, would escape._

_The launch of individual missiles from the human ships was surprising. Surely they would have been more effective if launched in a single salvo, like the missiles currently nearing fifteen light seconds? Single missiles would easily be picked off by point defence, and... ah! So, they were counter missiles? Clever. But they couldn't posses many of them. The new drives were bulky things. The Colonials couldn't possibly have miniaturised them enough to fit a large number into vessels that small. They would have been better served devoting the space to extra launchers. Still, it would reduce the efficiency of missile and fighter attacks, while they lasted at least. No matter, the fleet had other options._

_Twenty Basestars accelerated towards their tiny foes, and their point defence prepared to swat aside the puny opening salvo the humans had thrown at them._

_--- _

40 missiles hurtled through space. They didn't care about the hopelessness of the situation. They didn't care about the impending death of their human creators. The only thing that occupied their simple electronic minds were the targets before them. They were difficult. The unknown ships radiated very little, including infra-red and radio. In any case, the seekers on the missiles weren't designed to track such things. The lack of a powerful drive signature meant they had to use active sensors. This was not desirable. Active sensors meant that enemy point defence would have an easier time tracking.

The computers controlling the missiles didn't really care about this, either, not in the way a human would. They felt no frustration or disappointment that more of them than usual would die before they reached their targets. The only reason they note the detail at all was to adjust their pre-programmed countermeasure package.

---

_The intelligences in control of the fleet stuttered in shock for micro seconds- an eternity for a high speed computer. The incoming salvo had suddenly and without warning blanketed the space around it with jamming. None of the sensors on the Basestars could even see them any more. The targeting emissions of active warheads indicated that they were still there, but the number of threat sources had increased increased to 120!_

_ ---  
_

The Cylon fleet had no idea where the incoming salvo was until it was right on top of them. The two targeted Basestars had just over a second to recognise the missiles signatures emerging from the hash of static that obscured their sensors. One of them fired it's point defence wildly, but the shots went wide. The other didn't react at all. Each received twenty 700 megaton nuclear missiles on the surface of their hulls. When the explosions dissipated, there was only drifting wreckage.

---

_The fleet reeled in shock. The unexpected ECM, the close, perfect coordination of the missiles on to just two targets to overwhelm their point defence, the power of the warheads... They had all been unexpected. And two Basestars had been lost as a result. The next salvo's would, presumably, be targeted on only one Basestar each. Those ships _must not_ be allowed to launch more missiles. The fleet _would not _be defeated by a mere six ships!_

_--- _

There were whoops and cheers on the bridge of _Atlantis_ as the two alien ships vanished. Just like their missiles had seemed to lack any ECM, their ships seemed to lack any experience with it. Only one of the targeted vessels had responded, and it's point defence was late, and fire wide. The only response from the alien ships was to increase their acceleration.

'And now we die,' Commodore Harrison thought. SF 27 had gotten off better than it had any right to. The enemy missiles had seemed to lack any ECM whatsoever, and all the birds of the first wave had been picked off well short of the flotilla. The second volley had penetrated point defence, but had made it clear that the enemy had no battlelink. The fire was spread over multiple ships, and arrived piecemeal, leaving gaps for close in defences to exploit. Even with the large numbers of missiles directed at them, the point defence of SF 27 had never been saturated. Only three missiles of the second wave penetrated the Terran defensive shell, and by the end of the barrage, the _Greyhound _and the _Excalibur_ had been streaming air, but had suffered no erosion of combat effectiveness.

The third wave had been a different story. It had arrived at about the same time as the fighters. No one had really expected to have to deal with them. The cruisers should have been dead long before the fighters arrived. Point defence crews had hunched over gunnery consoles grimly, determined to destroy as many fighters as possible. And had frozen in shock as the horde of fighters had spawned an even vaster wave of missiles. _London's_ battlenet had crashed under the sudden massive influx of targeting data, leaving half the flotilla's defence in local control. Half of the units in _Atlantis's_ battlegroup refused to engage, unable to process such massive amounts of data. The missiles had swept across the Terran formation like a vengeful hurricane. The command cruiser _London_ and her battlegroup, the heavy cruisers _Greyhound _and _Sherwood_ had been swept from the universe, as had the heavy cruiser _Antelope_. _Excalibur _was a drifting hulk with no power, and _Atlantis_ had no drives or weapons left. It was with vengeful glee that the surviving bridge crew note the three Terran salvoes en route to their targets meant three kills.

"Comm, update the Requiem drone with all our data, and send it off. Transmit any data they don't already have to the carriers. Attach the message 'Good luck. We were proud to do our duty.'"

"Message sent, sir."

"Thank you. It's been a pleasure serving with you, ladies and gentlem..." He was interrupted by the fourth missile salvo, which finished the job the raiders started.

---

**Imperial City**

**Sol**

**1st July 2467 TSR**

**1350hrs**

"There must be some way to open a dialogue with them!" Juliet Forrester's voice echoed across the Lower House of the Royal and Imperial parliament. The immense room was packed. Every MP in Sol was present, a far cry from the usual sparse turnout at sessions that should have been no more than unimportant wrangling over very little.

News of the attack on SF 27 had changed that. The arrival of the _Kira_ and_ Dragon_ in Wilhelm, transmitting news of the attack, had prompted an immediate courier dispatch from the station commander. Very little was known about the attack yet. The data from the carriers and the single drone recovered was still being analysed. But some members of parliament had access to information that others did not yet have.

Charles Carson winced as Forrester continued. "We have no need for another war at this moment. The Ascellians are quite bad enough. We don't want another enemy from the unexplored regions. I propose that we dispatch a diplomatic team to make contact." There was a rumble of assent. "I also propose that we not send additional military units to the region until we know more. We don't want to provoke them, after all." Her image left the large screen that allowed all in the room to see her.

"Does anyone wish to speak?" Asked the Speaker of parliament, and elderly man named Matthew Thomas. Charles depressed his attention button.

"The Honourable Member for Xona has the floor."

"Honourable Members," began Charles. "You all know the basic facts behind what occurred. You know that SF 27 left Sentinal, and arrived in M324-02 safely. You know that survey operations began, and that some point soon after the start of those operations, an unknown fleet was discovered, and a confrontation occurred, during which the escort of SF 27, barring _Kira _and _Dragon_ were destroyed."

"However, you are not aware of all the facts available at the moment." He paused. "As you know, I am the only member of the Parliamentary Board of Military Oversight present here today. The other members are returning to Earth as fast as they can. As a result, I have been briefed on the most recent conclusions drawn from the data sent by Commodore Harrison. ONI has confirmed that there were in fact two groups of aliens, one of which appears to still be using some form of reaction drive. They have also confirmed that it was the unknown aliens that fired first!" There was a disapproving hiss. "I propose that we detail extra fleet units to the area, so as to guard the Empire from attack. We should, of course," he motioned towards Forrester "follow the Honourable Member's suggestion of sending a diplomatic mission. However," his face hardened. "Diplomacy is useless if they turn out to be like the Ascellians. It's better to be safe than sorry, after all."

---

--

-

AN: Sorry about the wait. Things have been... a little hectic. Problems with uni, problems with family, and computer problems, which happen to be linked to the uni problems. As a result of the latter, I lost all the planning I'd already done, as well as all my draft chapters, which kinda sucks, really. As a result, expect a fair wait between each chapter for the foreseeable future. I'm on Easter break at the moment, so I'll try to get caught up, but I have a ton of more important work to do as well, so no promises.

As always, constructive feedback welcomed. Flames will be ignored, or responded to with flames. If anybody wants to pre-read for me, drop me an email at mdt105soton.ac.uk


	5. Chapter 4

Disclaimer: Much as I wish BSG was mine, I don't own it.

In the Eye of the Storm, Chapter 4

**Deep Space, unknown coordinates**

**25th July 2467 TSR**

**0600hrs**

_Galactica _hung in space, her drives dead for the first time in years. Great rents in her hull vented atmosphere, burning chemicals and debris like fiery blood. Tiny figures swarmed over her, ant like in comparison to the size of the vessel, dragging hoses or bulky repair equipment to the areas most critically in need.

Chief Tyrol cursed the bulky, clumsy EVA suit he was currently wearing. It made all his movements slow, imprecise and difficult, and it's field of vision left much to be desired. He shifted his grip on the nozzle of the hose he and the motley damage control crew behind him had managed to drag through the smoke filled hell that _Galactica's_ remaining pressurised compartments had become, and then through the airless mortuary the Cylon missiles had transformed at least a third of the battlestar into. Checking that it was pointed to the base of the inferno before him, he activated the radio built into his helmet.

"Alright!" He called. "Hit it!"

"Got it, chief!" Responded the marine corporal hunched over the fire suppression unit's control module.

The hose twitched, causing the five people holding the flexible tube to tighten their grip on the handholds provided along it's length. The chief bit back another curse as the hose bucked in his hands, struggling to keep it pointed at the base of the blaze. Finally, a stream of white foam shot from the hose, sputtering into the chemical fuelled fire in front of him. The flames recoiled from the inert foam, retreating from the slowly advancing damage control party, and revealing a hell of scorched and melted metal that had, at one point, been a corridor. It was slow going. The fire fought tenaciously, and by the time the last flames were extinguished, Tyrol was afraid they were going to run out of suppressant.

"Good work people." He muttered, wiping his faceplate clear of the residue deposited by the extinguished fire. "Any word from CIC?"

"None, Chief." Replied one of his impromptu team. The insignia on his suit indicated he was an engineer, but Tyrol had no idea what the man's name was, or whether the suit actually belonged to him. "Looks like this entire area's been cut off. Don't look like there's any power- not even the emergency lights're on. Toasters prob'ly took out all the runs to CIC from this part of the ship, so.."

"So we'll have to send someone there in person." The Chief finished for him. "Cally, you're up." He said, turning to the only member of the team he recognised.

"But Chief..."

"No! No buts. We can't just keep blundering around in here without knowing the situation or where we're needed the most. Get to CIC, or any part of the ship with active commo, and tell whoever's up there where we are, and that we need instructions. Then get back here as fast as you can. Go!"

"Bu.."

"That's an order!"

Cally grunted once, then turned and rushed off the way the part had come. Tyrol turned to his remaining followers, pulling the welding torch out of his equipment belt.

"C'mon, we've got work to do." He said, indicating the ruined corridor with a wave of the tool. "Get those chem tanks sealed!"

* * *

Staring at the multitude of red lights at the damage control station, Adama felt sick. The Cylons had pounded _Galactica_ until she was almost a complete wreck. There was no way he could protect the fleet if the Cylons managed to follow them any time soon. 

Or what was left of the fleet, anyway. A glance at the wildly flickering dradis display indicated that just under two thirds of the fleet has managed to escape the Cylon trap. He was grimly certain that, had it not been for the Cylon's sudden and inexpicable attack on those mystery contacts, the machines would have gotten the whole fleet. He had no idea of the status of those ships- _Galactica_ could no longer receive incoming communications after a Cylon nuke had burned the receiver assemblies from existence, but she still had some transmitters left, which was nothing short of a miracle, in his carefully unvoiced opinion. As soon as _Galactica _had emerged from transit, he had ordered the fleet to scatter at the first sign of any Cylon pursuit, and to rendezvous as soon as possible at a nearby blue giant star. Fortunately, the Cylons had not yet come after the battered refugee fleet.

"What do we have left?" He asked a battered Lieutenant Gaeta, who was bleeding from a gash on his forehead.

"Not much, sir" Gaeta replied, wiping the blood from his eyes, and leaning heavily against the side of the nearest console. "Engines are dead, and most of our starboard weapons are gone." He indicated the solid wall of red lights on the starboard aspect of the ship. "Starboard flight pod's gone as well, but it was still non operational. We've lost all of our receivers, and ninety percent of our transmitter arrays. Dradis is still functional, barely, but we've lost internal communications to almost everything aft of frame twenty one on our starboard side, so we can't coordinate our damage control efforts."

"What about the magazines, and fuel storage?"

"Magazines are safe, sir. Ammunition hoists are all broken on to starboard, but the failsafes stopped any backblast from starting off a cook up." The lieutenant leant forward and rested his finger on a cluster of blinking lights. "Fuel is another matter. We've got chemical fires from frame twenty six aft to frame thirty two. The whole area's open to vacuum, and it's one of the areas cut off from communications. There are several almost full tylieum tanks near the blaze, and two more in this section." He pointed to another area on the representation, where the lights blazed solid red. "That area was shredded by armour fragments when the armour in the area was penetrated by several Raider nukes. There's a tylieum spill advancing down towards frame twenty nine, but it's not ablaze yet. If we don't get the fires put out, or stop that spill, the Cylons will arrive here to find a debris field."

Adama glared at the schematic for nearly three seconds.

"Who do we have in contact?"

"From damage control? I've got a marine sergeant with most of a platoon. He's got suits, but no damage control equipment. There's also most of the deck crew from the port flight pod. The Chief went to help with damage control before all the pilots got back, and took Cally with him. We don't know where they are at the moment, but the rest of the deck crew are moving over to help right now."

"They have supplies?"

"Yes sir. Suits and tools."

"Have them take enough for this sergeant, and meet him here." Adama stabbed a finger at an area just outside the encroaching tylieum spill. "Clean up or stop that slick, then tell them to help with fire suppression. And make sure they take some proper radios, and distribute them to any damage control teams they find."

"I'll get right on it sir."

* * *

**Cylon Base Star**  
**M324-02  
26th July 2467 TSR**

The Six model looked at the heat warped lump of metal in her hand, and traced the twisted by recogniseable letters etched into the brass square. The Colonial Standard characters.

"What does it say?"

The model eleven opposite her shrugged.

"We don't know."

"What?"

"We don't know. The letters themselves are Colonial Standard. Well, most of them, anyway. There look like there are some extras. The language is completely unkown."

"So they're human"

"Yes. The bodies we've found confirm that."

"But not colonial?"

"Not unless they've developed an entirely new language whilest they've been out here. Not to mention the advanced nature of the thechnology we've recovered."

"So who are they? The mysterious Thirteenth Tribe from their silly Sacred Scrolls?"

"Possibly. If so, it makes little difference. We will destroy them like we did the Colonies. God will accept nothing else."

"Of course. That goes without saying. Do you know where we will strike?"

"Not yet. The computers recovered from the wrecks are being analysed now. It shouldn't be long."

"Good."

Six traced the letters on the brass, and wondered what 'HMS London, CA(C)-243, launched 23rd August 2451 TSR, Sigismund I Shipyard, Earth' meant.

* * *

A.N: Yeah, yeah. Most of a year since I updated. This is, essentially, just to let anyone who might want to know that I'm still alive. I was going to make this significantly longer, but RL is still being unplesant, and I figured that I might as well post what I had at a convinent cut off point. It's about a third of what I had planned for chapter 4, but I have it done up to this point, and probably won't finish the last two thirds until after Christmas. I've said to people who emailed me that this wasn't dead, and I mean it!  



End file.
